Alphabetical Order
by WednesdaysChild451208
Summary: AU, Lesser Evil didn't happen. Victor shows up in 'Breach of Faith.'
1. Chapter 1

**I was originally planning for this to just stay on my computer, but I decided to upload it anyway. This is an AU, basicaly the latter half of season 2 doesn't happen at all, season 3 happens first, season 4 up to 'Breach of Faith' happens, then the first half of season 2 happens, and finally this version of 'Breach of Faith' shows up. (Feel free to message me if that didn't make sense.) I know I made Victor very OOC, but that's because this is two years after Lesser Evil. That equals two more years under Carla's thumb. **

Victor watched as Michael's client, Josh, walked into a bank. He waited for a few minutes before following in, gun in hand. Considering Josh's emotional state he actually did a fairly good job of taking control of the situation in Victor's opinion. At least until Victor came in.

Josh pointed his gun at Victor until he realized Victor had one of his own, then Josh dropped his. Victor was confused until he picked it up, it was too light. He removed the clip and confirmed his suspicion, it was empty.

"You're robbing a bank with an empty gun?"

"I just meant to scare them." Josh protested.

"Good job." Victor said dryly, he was in no mood to be dealing with the ignorant. He was about to depart further wisdom regarding proper hostage-taking technique, when Michael and Sam came in.

_In training, they tell you to never get emotionally involved in any operation. It sounds easy enough, until you do get emotionally involved. _

Victor couldn't help the feeling of dread upon seeing Michael, mainly because it meant he could no longer delay killing him.

"I'm sorry Michael." Josh apologized, mirroring Victor's thoughts, from his position on the floor to the right of Patty.

"It's ok Josh, you were just trying to help." He looked just as exasperated by the situation as Victor felt.

"Help who?" Victor asked without thinking.

_When you're a spy, you don't often get the full picture. Usually it's annoying, the whole 'not knowing why you're doing what you're doing' thing does get old, but sometimes it makes the job a lot easier. _

"It's a charity for families of soldiers who were killed in combat, Nick scammed them out of several thousand dollars."

Victor checked Josh's eyes which confirmed that Michael's story was the truth. *Great, could this get any more complicated?* It took all of Victor's self-control to not just walk away. That would just be procrastinating what had to be done. Also that would leave four other witnesses that would indirectly alert Carla that he was the one killing her operatives, making his mission much harder. Victor sighed, he simply had to kill Josh, but he would make sure the charity got its money back.

Victor turns to Nick, "Where is the money?"

"What money? I don't have any money!" Nick says too quickly.

_When you're threatening people, it's often just as much about what you don't say as what you do say. Keep people in the dark about what you're capable of, and they have to assume the worst. _

"Careful, you are very close to insulting my intelligence." Victor noticed a small smile playing on Michael's lips, obviously he wasn't opposed to the idea of Nick fishing pieces of his tongue out of a garbage disposal.

The way Victor said that he was about to insult his intelligence must have clued Nick in as to how close Victor was to making the last guy who insulted him feel lucky. "I'll go get it."

When Nick left Victor directed everyone else into a corner, he would kill Michael first; then Sam, Josh, and Patty; and then go kill Nick. It was a straight-forward plan, so the reality shouldn't be so difficult. Victor had killed people before with no problem, but he had been going after Carla's operatives in alphabetical order for a reason.

That reason was now standing in front of the other three hostages in that deluded "protecting innocent people" mode that Victor had come to admire. To bad Michael had to die.

_When you're holding people at gun-point, especially if one of them is a trained operative, there are two particularly important rules that you need to follow. One, never take your eyes off the target, and two, never get distracted. _

Victor was distracted just long enough for Michael to take his gun and knock him down. Victor looked up and saw Michael pointing the gun at him.

His first reaction was anger, he was too close to killing all of Carla's operatives, a considerable chunk of the organization he hoped to completely gut someday, for this to happen. Victor hit his head on the wall out of frustration. It hurt, but it did make him feel better.

Second came relief. The fight was over, trying to take down an organization by yourself did get tiring. He failed, but at least it was over. And the fact that Carla wasn't going to be the one to kill him did help raise his mood to the point that he started laughing dementedly.

Then it sunk in that he failed in avenging his wife and son. *Ok Sport, you really need to kill me in the next two seconds, because I am not crying in front of anyone. Two seconds later, Michael still hadn't killed him and Victor was now sobbing in a way that even the best actor in the world couldn't fake.

Michael watched in horror as Victor lost what was left of his mind. He could hardly believe what was happening, to Victor of all people. The guy who wouldn't know normal reality if it beat him up and said, "hi I'm normal reality. How are you today?" But then again, that may have been exactly what happened.

Michael gave the gun to Sam and got a zip tie from his pocket. He went over to Victor and zip-tied his hands. Victor was too busy having a mental meltdown and being surprised that Michael hadn't killed him yet to protest.

Michael sat down beside Victor, and after a while with some coaxing got Victor to lay his head on his shoulder. Michael repeated "It's ok" like a mantra, even though he was certain that anything that would cause Victor to break down was definitely not ok, but it was all he could think of to say.

Victor didn't understand what was going on. So, when his sobs turned into silent tears, and Michael helped him up and lead him toward the conference room he just followed numbly. On their way to the conference room Michael paused next to Sam and gave him another zip tie.

*How many of those does Michael carry around?* Victor thought absently, he was still mostly out of it.

Michael refused the gun Sam offered him. "Go find Nick." Michael directed.

This confused Victor, even though having his hands bound was inconvenient Victor could still kill him in many different horrible ways. He didn't though, even though Michael practically asked him to.

When they got to the conference room, Michael helped Victor into a chair and went straight for the vending machines. It had been several hours since his last yogurt and the vending machine had his favorite brand. "You want something Victor?"

_When you face death every day, eating properly loses meaning. _

Victor spotted a row of Yoohoos. "A Yoohoo."

If Michael had any reservations about giving him a glass bottle he didn't show it. When Michael got the yogurt and Yoohoo he sat down and went straight to business. "Do you mind telling me why you tried to blow me up?" Michael had started to respect Victor during their who-taps-out-first fight and it had turned into something akin to fondness. When he found out that it was Victor who was trying to kill him it had hurt, in more ways than one.

"You make it sound so personal. I was removing operatives from the field, you were cogs in a machine. I just hit that machine with a baseball bat."

The fact that it wasn't personal made Michael feel better.

Victor hoped that Michael would drop the subject, because it was getting dangerously close to a very sensitive subject. *Come on Sport, why can't you just ask for some super top secret military secrets?*

"Why'd you hit the machine then?"

"They burned me. I wanted revenge."

Michael easily saw through his false reasoning. "I think it's more than that."

"It's private."

"I respect that, but it's a little hard to trust someone when they've tried to kill you, three times."

Victor shuddered and Michael was afraid that he was going to lose his thin veil of composure. "I have proof, it's on my boat."

"Ok, I need to resolve the situation with Nick. Then we'll go to your boat."

"I'll be here." Victor said with some of his usual humor. He felt better, but that probably meant he had officially lost what was left of his mind.

Sam came in with Nick. "Mikey, I gave Josh the money and Patty said she'd forget about everything after we explained what happened."

"How did you explain away Victor?"

"I said he was another person Nick scammed."

"You can't do this!" Nick protested.

"You got any duct tape Mikey?"

"Yep."

_The Boy Scouts motto is always be prepared for a reason. Some follow that rule to the point of overkill, for good reason. _

Nick took the hint and stopped talking.

"I was going to take care of Nick but we only have one gun." Sam was uncomfortable discussing their lack of weapons in front of Victor.

"That's fine, go ahead." Victor was aware that he was openly gaping at this point and tried to hide it by playing with the empty Yoohoo bottle.

That didn't help Sam's anxiety. "You sure Mike?"

"Sam!"

"Got it."

After Sam left, Michael pulled out a knife.

Victor wasn't afraid to die, he'd accepted that attempting to gut an organization would probably involve his own death eventually. But that fact that Michael hadn't called Carla the instant he'd confirmed that he was after her organization implied that Michael was after it too.

That didn't make not going after him with the Yoohoo bottle, a move that would most likely end with them both dead and no one left to bring down Carla, that much easier.

"Wait a minute Sport, I have a lot of information on Carla to fill your pretty head with!"

Victor's words made Michael reanalyze the situation. *This looks really bad.* He thought, looking down at the knife. "I said we would go to your boat." He sent the point home by cutting the ziptie. Michael wasn't very worried about Victor trying to kill him. He hadn't a minute ago, when he was under the impression that Michael was about to literally execute him, so he probably wasn't going to now.

Michael had been acting strangely ever since he arrived, but his latest move left Victor looking from the table to Michael repeatedly in confusion. Michael didn't offer any further explanation, but simply walked towards the exit. Victor had no idea what was going on, but he followed him anyway.

_As a spy, it's all about intel. It doesn't matter if you're a legitimate spy working for the CIA or a rouge operative with the pretense of working for an organization without a name, being in the dark is not ideal. _

**Should I continue putting this up? **


	2. Chapter 2

**Hi!**

"You drive." Michael throws him the keys and Victor gets into the car.

"Nice ride." He was starting to act like his normal self again. "So Sport, do you have a plan?"

"Covering what?" As far as Michael was concerned they were going to need several plans to get out of this. Not including plan B's through Z's.

"We're going to my boat to prove that I'm not working some angle for Carla, then what?" Victor specified.

"Well, the situation with Carla hasn't changed. So we can keep pretending that we're just innocent pawns for a while. But Carla is already suspicious as to what's taking me so long to find out who's trying to kill me."

"So I'll have to fake my death, sounds fun!" He wasn't being sarcastic; Michael suspected Victor probably killed off some of his cover ID's just for the fun of it.

They arrive at the marina. When Michael moves to get out of the charger Victor grabs his arm. "Listen Sport, you can't tell anyone about this. Not Sam, not your girlfriend, not even your mom."

"Fi's not my girlfriend!"

Victor just smiles and exits the car. *Denial.*

"She's not!" Michael gets out and catches up with him, which proves to be a mistake because Victor was still smiling. *I wonder how he'd react if I pushed him off the dock?*

They reach the boat. _It's the little things that tell a lot about a person. Often what they say is, in and of itself, insignificant. But what they imply can be very valuable. If someone has a boat named 'Solitude' it could imply that the owner spends much of his time alone. That equals plenty of free time to learn a lot about you. _

When Michael opens the door Victor pulls hims back, barely in time for him to avoid being blown up. "I forgot to mention, I have the door boobytrapped with a claymore."

"You forgot about the fact that you boobytrapped the door with an explosive?" Michael asked skeptically. He didn't think that forgetting about an explosive attached to your door would be possible.

Victor pointed at some older burn marks. "No matter how many times I almost blow myself up, it never gets less exciting!"

*Apparently it is.* Since Victor enters the boat without further hesitation, Michael assumes that he only had one explosive rigged to go off. That doesn't mean he lowers his guard.

Victor heads straight to his bed and brings out the blue container. He hesitates, there was still time to kill Michael and keep the box's contents to himself. Ever since Victor figured out that Carla had his family killed, he had slowly became more and more introverted. Spies are generally private people, it's essential, but Victor had gone further than that. It was getting to the point that it was getting in the way of his wrangling job. If this situation was happening any other way, with anyone else, he would never in a million years even consider telling about his family. As it was, killing Michael, much as Victor didn't want to, was gaining points by the second.

Michael could see the wheels turning in Victor's head, and he could guess the subject. As Victor's wranglee for the past three years, Michael witnessed his retreat from contact with other people. At first, Victor was easy enough to monitor as he frequented many public places all over Miami, but now he was near impossible to track. If he had asked for this information two years ago he probably would have had an easier time getting it. But now knowing Victor he was probably considering killing him.

_When you're dealing with a trained operative, you have to assume they're as good as you. If you would conceal going for a weapon with going for information, he probably had the same idea. _

Michael spotted the gun when Victor opened the box. When Victor picked it up Michael immediatly had his gun aimed at him.

Victor got a newspaper article out, put the box back under his bed, and stashed his gun in a pocket. When Victor turns around Michael quickly hides his gun hand behind him. "Paranoid much Sport?"

**This wasn't really where I wanted to end a chapter, but it's been awhile since I put the first chapter up and I wanted to establish that this story isn't dead. **


End file.
